Fantasy Football Is Stupid

My celly has been blowing up more than usual recently. Since more often than not I hear Marky Mark's I Need Money, that can only mean one person is calling - my bookie. And since it's my bookie calling so frequently, that can only mean one thing - football season.

Now, I loves me some me. And by me, I mean football. Weekends in the fall are some of the most glorious times in the Shitty Captain's life. Because of football. And Percocets.

I love football so much that I want to make out with it.
But only the cheerleader part. And maybe Tom Brady.

There's been this ever-growing fad over the past half-decade or so, though, that has been feeding off of my love like a voracious parasite. This tapeworm is Fantasy Football.

Seriously, it's like one of the stupidest things ever invented. If ever there were something that could make Armchair General Managers think they know about sports when they don't, fantasy football is it.

To wit: I know this guy, we'll call him Canary, for lack of a better term. All through college this guy never watched a lick of sports. Spouting pretentious metaphysical bullshit while trying to be the coolest guy you know (and failing miserably) was more his style. Suddenly, though, after he graduates, he becomes a self-described football guru. He "knows" which college star will best be suited for the Steelers 3-4 Defense. He "knows" which team will take the AFC South this year. He even started up a shitty website to share his gridiron thoughts with the world. All this because he started playing fantasy football and it gave him this odd false sense of thinking he knows what he's talking about.

A few weeks ago I got to spend a lovely afternoon manhandling the libido of a lady from the neighborhood whose husband was participating in not one, but three drafts that day. He'd been laboring for weeks over reports and "professional" analysis and failed to remember that his wife had one of those things called a vagina.

Thinking all her lonely-ladyparts problems solved once the draft happened, it seems she flipped a switch when her man lamented (with little contrition, mind you) about all the time over the next four-plus months he would have to dedicate to stat-keeping and deciding who his starters would be before heading out the door for the next 18 hours.

We ran into each other in the pharmacy department of the local supermarket - she was looking for migraine relief and I needed Robitussin for the party I was hosting later that evening. I picked up a bottle of Excedrin she dropped and as I handed it back she asked rather spontaneously if I played fantasy football. "Never in my life have I ever cavorted with that particular beast," I replied. After that, she instructed me to follow her home.

We've got a standing date for the next 17 Tuesdays. That's the night her husband, head of the stats committee of two of his leagues, meets to divvy up last week's points among the players. So maybe Fantasy Football isn't all that bad.